Khris Davis is a 28 year old, righty swinger who hits the ball deep. Unlike many others who follow that path, Davis is a pretty small fella who is about 5’11”, 195 lbs. Not exactly a massive dude. Regardless of how he looks in a swimsuit, Davis isn’t a sexy play in 2016 but he is one that produces pop from his bat and therefore is worth spending some time looking at.
MINORS
Davis has appeared in 421 minor league games. In that time he has an impressive slash line that includes a .285 batting average, .389 OBP and .501 SLG. He also went deep 69 times with 41 steals while striking out 352 times.
MAJORS
2013: Davis appeared in 56 games as a rookie hitting .279 with 11 big flies and a .949 OPS.
2014: Davis appeared in 144 games hitting .244 with 22 homers, 69 RBI and 70 runs scored.
2015: Davis appeared in 121 games hitting .247 with a career best 27 homers while knocking in 66 runners and scoring 54 times.
SKILLS – UGLY
I can simply, and quickly, dismiss a few components of his game.
Davis would be lucky to steal 6-8 bases. He’s swiped 10 the last two seasons and he’s not going to do anything here with just 23 steals the last four seasons (minor league numbers included).
Davis isn’t going to help at all in the batting average category.
Over the last two seasons he’s hit .244 and .247 and for his career that average mark is .250. That’s below the league average of .258 in that time.
Davis has a .281 career BABIP. That’s slightly below the .295 mark the last three years.
Davis owns a 19.8 percent line drive rate. That’s slightly below the 20 percent mark the last three seasons.
There just isn’t anything to see here. Nothing going up, just not happening. Move on.
SKILLS – THE BAD
Davis has struck out 122 times each of the past two seasons. Doesn’t sound too bad, that is until you look deeper and notice the following: Davis had 393 at-bats last season. That means Davis would have struck out 171 times over 550 at-bats. That’s a pretty big number. He owns a 24.3 percent K-rate for his career. Not awful, but not exactly heartwarming either. As a result of all the strikeouts his BB/K rate for his career is a mere 0.31. He did improve that mark to 0.36 in 2015, though that is still below the 0.39 mark that was the league average last season. I do like the 10 percent walk rate, well above his 7.6 percent career mark, but the increase in whiffs still made him a below than average performer in BB/K.
Davis’ GB/FB is both “bad” and “good.” I will get to the good in a second. The bad? His career mark of 1.03 is slightly below average. That helps him to hit homers, lifting the ball as much as he does, but it also hurts his ability to produce hits. Why? Fly balls turn into hits much less frequently than do ground balls.
SKILLS – THE GOOD
Davis can power the ball pretty well. Folks might be selling you this line. ‘Davis hit 21 homers in the second half last season and he’s about to explode in 2016.’ Is that true?
1 – Davis hit 22 homers in 2014.
2 – Davis hit 27 homers in 2015.
3 – Davis averaged a homer every 12.4 at-bats in 2013. In 2014 he averaged a homer every 22.8 at-bats. Last season the number flew up to 14.5 homers per at-bat. Is he the superstar of rookie or year #3 or is he the more moderate option from year two? Perhaps he’s just the guy who averages a big fly every 17.2 at-bats? If he gets 550 at-bats at that level of one every 17.2 at-bats he would hit 32 homers. Everyone would take that, though it’s still well below his crazy 2015 second half pace.
4 – Dais has a 39.5 percent fly ball rate. That mark is about five points above the big league average. That certainly helps a fella that wants to life the ball for some big fly love.
5 – Davis has a 20.0 percent HR/F ratio the last three years. Amongst players with at least 1,000 plate appearances the last three seasons is 12th in baseball. It’s a big boy number. His minor league mark was 19.1 percent by the way, supporting that large big league number.
6 – Davis owns a strong slugging percentage for his career. Whether it’s a lefty or a righty doesn’t matter a ton. His slash lines are only .016 points apart with a slightly higher mark of .813 against righties. His SLG of .493 against righties is two points below his career mark of .495 against lefties. He does SLG much better at home (.534) than on the road (.451).
Davis owns a .244 Isolated Power mark the past three seasons. That mark is 10th in baseball ahead of guys like Bryce Harper (.238), Jose Abreu (.237) and Miguel Cabrera (.234). I’m not going to say that Davis is lucky, but I’m also not completely comfortable with saying he’s a better power threat than men like that.
NOTE: Davis was dealt to the Athletics after this article was written. This is a significant move for Davis. He should still play daily, but moving from Milwaukee to Oakland is not a ballpark move that benefits him in the least. In fact, it’s scary bad for him. Let’s compare the Park Factors for each stadium last year.
2015 | Runs | HR | 2B | Hits |
Milwaukee | 7th | 1st | 8th | 10th |
Oakland | 16th | 27th | 17th | 18th |
As you can plainly see, this is a brutal move for his power outlook. But, as @naturalslugger on Twitter pointed out, Davis does mash the ball deep, and maybe Oakland can't contain him. Check out what happens if we overlay his homers from last season on the park in Oakland.
Maybe it's not a deathblow to his power outlook, but it's certainly not going to help him in the batting average in the least.
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OUTLOOK
Khris Davis is a power hitter. Well, sort of. Depends how you define that term actually. Can Davis hit .30 homers in 2016? He could. Is he a lock to? No he isn’t, especially playing half his games in Oakland. He’s a limited power hitter who had a strong second half last season. I see things more that way than thinking that his second half portends a breakout campaign in the coming season.
10-team Mixed: Not every interested here. A poor batting average for this format hurts as does no discernable speed component. I didn’t mention it above, but all that swinging and lack of base hitting also has limited Davis to a mere .315 OBP for his career, slightly below the league average. That means he’s also doing nothing for you in the runs scored category. A bench option only.
12-team Mixed: No average, no speed, unlikely to be a significant contributor in the batting average category. Does that sound like someone you want to be targeting? I will answer for you – no. Davis has that power bat and that certainly fits a bunch of team’s needs, but you have to realize who Davis is and what he can offer (and how his new park ain’t gonna help him at all). He’s much more likely to slightly improve on last season than to take the step to Todd Frazier like levels.
15-team Mixed: The power plays, and the size of the league helps to mitigate the weaknesses he has. Still, given this profile, he’s still more of a depth outfielder than someone that will take the next step. If you need a 25-75 guy with a poor average than Davis is your man. If you’re taking him at a point in the draft that you’re expecting him to grow into a .270-30-90 season you will be disappointed.
AL-Only: Only eighteen American Leaguers hit 25 homers last season. Even with his limits, that makes Davis a player to remain very cognizant of on draft day. I’m still a fan of his in this format.
To see where Davis ranks take a look at our 2016 Rankings that are part of the MLB Draft Guide.
Ray Flowers can be heard Monday through Friday, 7 PM EDT and Friday on SiriusXM Fantasy Sports Radio (Sirius 210, XM 87). You can also hear Ray Sunday nights at 6 PM on the channel talking fantasy sports. Follow Ray’s work at Fantasy Alarm and on Twitter (@baseballguys).